VI.] THE SOUTHERN MONGOLS. 2OJ 



Siamese branch, which forms the bulk of the population in 

 the Menam basin. In this highly favoured region of vast hill- 

 encircled alluvial plains of inexhaustible fertility, traversed by 

 numerous streams navigable for light craft, and giving direct 

 access to the inland waters of Malaysia, the Southern Shans were 

 able at an early date to merge the primitive tribal groups in a 

 great nationality, and found a powerful empire, which at one time 

 dominated most of Indo-China and the Malay Peninsula. 



Siam, alone of all the Shan states, even still maintains a pre- 

 carious independence, although now again reduced by European 

 aggression to little more than the natural limits of the fluvial 

 valley, which is usually regarded by the Southern Shans as the 

 home of their race. Yet they appear to have been here pre- 

 ceded by the Caucasic Khmers (Carnbojans), whose advent is 

 referred in the national chronicles to the year 543 B.C. and who, 

 according to the Hindu records, were expelled about 443 A.D. 

 It was through these Khmers, and not directly from India, that 

 the "Sayamas" received their Hindu culture, and the Siamese 

 annals, mingling fact with fiction, refer to the miraculous birth of 

 the national hero, Phra-Ruang, who threw off the foreign yoke, 

 declared the people henceforth Thai, "Freemen," invented the 

 present Siamese alphabet, and ordered the Khom (Cambojan) to 

 be reserved in future for copying the sacred writings. 



The introduction of Buddhism is assigned to the year 638 A.D., 

 one of the first authentic dates in the native records. The ancient 

 city of Labong had already been founded (575), and other settle- 

 ments now followed rapidly, always in the direction of the south, 

 according as the Shan race steadily advanced towards the sea- 

 board, driving before them or mingling with Khmers, Lawas, 

 Karens, and other aborigines, some now extinct, some still sur- 

 viving on the wooded uplands and plateaux encircling the Menam 

 valley. Ayuthia, the great centre of national life in later times, 

 dates only from the year 1350. when the empire had received its 

 greatest expansion, comprising the whole of Camboja, Pegu, 

 Tenasserim, and the Malay Peninsula, and extending its conquer- 

 ing arms across the inland waters as far as Java 1 . Then followed 



In the Javanese annals the invaders are called " Cambojans," but at this 

 time (about 1340) Camboja had already been reduced, and the Siamese conquerors 



